TheCable

There are two things we can thank God for as we become 59 years old as a nation tomorrow:  One, our oil is yet to dry up. Two, we have successfully kicked poverty, power-outage, insecurity and poverty from the corridors of power. I guess that was the sole reason why our political leaders went to the mosque on Friday and church on Sunday. Lest I forget, the common man too can thank God because he is yet to be either gunned down or kidnapped. He too should not forget to go to—either a mosque or church whenever its convenient for him.

Since 1960, we have been doing same things as a nation and it is amazing that we have been expecting different results. Every year, Nigerians are treated to the cold and tasteless tea of speeches from the corridors of power. Today is another day to make empty speeches by our varied moneybag-politicians and comfortable-clerics too will give our people false hope—that everything will soon be alright. They’d tell our people that they should endure some more, but the only challenge is that our political and religious leaders cannot tell our people how far their suffering is going to last. At least, the “children of Israel” were accurately told how long they would be under the yoke of slavery. Since when I was a little boy, they have all been promising us that Nigeria would become better, and now, I am beginning to have some grey hair on my head and funnily, they are still promising us a better Nigeria.

A few days ago, I was in Aba, in Abia State and it became clear to me that dreadful and horrific roads are everywhere in Nigeria. In Nigeria, while driving, you cannot avoid every pothole on our roads. The best you can do is to choose the ones you are going to enter while driving! Our people now change the shock-absorber of their cars—almost every two month! In fifty-nine (59) years, we haven’t been able to have pothole-free roads.

As if that is not enough, in fifty-nine (59) years, we are yet to be able to solve the problem of power-outage and we have sank trillions of naira into that bottomless-pit. As I am writing this “59^th Independence Day celebration” article, I am on generator. And it is very sure that there shall be power-outage while Buhari is “fulfilling all righteousness” at 7am this morning! We have been set-free from the British (on paper), though we are still under the control of their language and mode of dressing, but we are yet to be set-free from the bondage of power-outage. And any nation that is romancing darkness, power-outage can neither have shape nor truly grow!

The more we spend on electric power supply, the darker it becomes. And Nigerians are paying through their nostrils to purchase power-outage! Until we are all given “prepaid-meters” in Nigeria, we would never be able to have a stable electric power supply. But if the current status-quo is maintained in the power-sector of our economy, we would remain like this for the next 50 (fifty) years!

Also, in fifty-nine (59) years of our existence as a nation, we are still importing what we have in abundance! God has given us good brains, but we do not want to make use of them. Our refineries are not working productively. And we are exporting our crude oil to unknown destinations. And bringing refined-products into Nigeria from where Nigerians do not know. Until our refineries start working as they are perfectly working in sane climes, we would continue to be prodigal as a nation.

In recent times, Buhari and his vice said they would lift Nigerians out of poverty. This is not necessary; because every past poverty alleviation program ended up making rich people become richer and ended up making poor become people poorer! These are what Nigerians need from Buhari:  friendly economic policies, security, good roads and stable power-supply. If Buhari can make them all available, our people would lift themselves out of poverty!

Insecurity is one of the terrible-issues that have rendered our nation almost helpless and feeble. When GEJ was in power, he was dragged in the mud, because we lost some local governments to terrorists! And as an effect of this and some other grave issues, every mover and shaker in Nigeria came together and GEJ was forcefully voted out of power. Nigerians rejoiced after GEJ was sent back to “Otuoke,” because they were deceptively told that it was only GEJ who was standing in the way of our progress as a nation.

After GEJ came PMB. When PMB got to power, during his first-tenure in office, we were told that our soldiers have taken back every local government we lost to Boko Haram when GEJ was calling the shots of the affairs of Nigeria. Infact, we were told by our soldiers and politicians that we have technically degraded and defeated Boko Haram, but a few days ago, one of our law-makers told us that Boko Haram is still controlling a lot of local governments in the North East!

Lastly, at 59, we cannot adequately and satisfactorily protect our people! Today, Nigerians are so afraid to move from one point to another—traveling by road. Kaduna-Abuja expressway is fast becoming deserted because of kidnappers. By 1^st of October, 2020, we are going to become 60 as a nation. The question is: where do we go from here?